Responding to the report of the Chief Medical Officer, Dame Sally Davies, published today, Andy Bell said: "Mental ill health affects almost a quarter of us at any one time and costs more than £100 billion a year. Three-quarters of children and adults with mental health problems get no treatment at all. Yet effective early intervention can dramatically improve people’s lives and prevent future distress.

"We welcome the report's call for a greater focus on children's mental health. Children with behavioural problems face a lifetime of ill health and disadvantage. This can be prevented or mitigated through evidence-based parenting programmes yet few families get the help them need when they seek it.

"We welcome the Chief Medical Officer's focus on work. Too many people with mental health problems are given inadequate help to get or keep work. Yet employment can be an integral part of recovery for many people. Better help for people to retain employment and to get timely access to psychological therapy when they become unwell is crucial.

"The report recognises the importance of linking mental and physical health. Some 4.6 million people in England today have a long-term physical condition and a mental health condition. Improving support to people with physical and mental health needs is vital both to improve their health and to cut the £10 billion extra cost to the NHS.

"Mental health and wellbeing should be a major priority in twenty-first century public health. Every joint strategic needs assessment should include robust data about mental health from early childhood to later life. And this should be used to identify priorities for improved promotion, prevention, early intervention and recovery support."

The Nuffield Trust and Health Foundation's Quality Watch report is a stark reminder of the distance we have to travel to put access to mental health care on a par with that for physical health services.

We warmly welcome the Government's commitment to produce waiting time standards for mental health services. This is a vital step towards creating parity of access to mental health care and to overcoming the 'institutional bias' in the NHS.

Mental health services are unable to cope with demand for psychological therapies. Huge variations in referral rates and waiting times around the country are unacceptable and are making people more unwell.

Risk, Safety and Recovery argues that risk and safety are rightly major concerns in mental health care but that traditional clinical management methods of assessing risk have stood in the way of helping people to recover their lives.

Perinatal mental health problems carry a total cost to society of about £8.1 billion for each one-year cohort of births in the UK. But the NHS would need to spend just £337 million a year to bring perinatal mental health care up to the recommended level.